The Polarised Valence Quark Distribution from semi-inclusive DIS

The semi-inclusive difference asymmetry A^{h^{+}-h^{-}} for hadrons of opposite charge has been measured by the COMPASS experiment at CERN. The data were collected in the years 2002-2004 using a 160 GeV polarised muon beam scattered off a large polarised ^6LiD target and cover the range 0.006 < x < 0.7 and 1 < Q^2 < 100 (GeV/c)^2. In leading order QCD (LO) the asymmetry A_d^{h^{+}-h^{-}} measures the valence quark polarisation and provides an evaluation of the first moment of Delta u_v + Delta d_v which is found to be equal to 0.40 +- 0.07 (stat.) +- 0.05 (syst.) over the measured range of x at Q^2 = 10 (GeV/c)^2. When combined with the first moment of g_1^d previously measured on the same data, this result favours a non-symmetric polarisation of light quarks Delta u-bar = - Delta d-bar at a confidence level of two standard deviations, in contrast to the often assumed symmetric scenario Delta u-bar = Delta d-bar = Delta s-bar = Delta s.Comment: 7 pages, 3 figures, COMPASS, revised: details added, author list update

Psychology and Sustainability, Homo Technicusand Slow Tech

Psychology and Sustainability, Homo Technicus and Slow TechIn previous issues of Visions for Sustainabilitywe have often published papers that consider the relationship between psychology and sustainability. On the one hand, researchers have examined various aspects of the incompatibility between how human societies and individuals behave in order to satisfy their needs and their desires and the natural processes that are essential for maintaining ecological balance and integrity, both for the people themselves and the environments they inhabit. Problems of sustainability are clearly related to human behaviours and therefore are a part of the psychological sphere. Studies have often focused on examining ways of promoting pro-environmental and reducing anti-environmental behaviours

Generalised Thurston-Bennequin invariants for real algebraic surface singularities

A generalised Thurston-Bennequin invariant for a Q-singularity of a real algebraic variety is defined as a linking form on the homologies of the real link of the singularity. The main goal of this paper is to present a method to calculate the linking form in terms of the very good resolution graph of a real normal unibranch surface singularity. For such singularities, the value of the linking form is the Thurston-Bennequin number of the real link of the singularity. As a special case of unibranch surface singularities, the behaviour of the linking form is investigated on the Brieskorn double points x^m+y^n\pm z^2=0.Comment: 22 pages, TeX, 12 figure